Crypto Industry Meets With Trump to Promote Bitcoin Investments
WASHINGTON — Cryptocurrency industry leaders gathered at the White House Friday for a first-ever meeting with President Donald Trump and Treasury Department officials on how to leverage bitcoin and other blockchain investments as national assets.
They are asking for new laws that would unchain them from the Securities and Exchange Commission oversight they previously complained impeded growth of their industry.
“That will soon be over,” Trump said at the Crypto Summit.
In recent years, cryptocurrency has demonstrated its growth potential, he said.
“Let’s keep it that way,” Trump said.
He said that bitcoin and other cryptocurrency would “pave the way for groundbreaking innovations in institutional finance.”
The attendees included Brian Armstrong, chief executive of crypto trading platform Coinbase, who expressed gratitude toward Trump for encouraging digital asset investment.
Coinbase donated millions of dollars to Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. It is the nation’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
Trump wants cryptocurrency investment to be an economic backstop that would help the United States maintain a lead in international finance. He pledged during his reelection campaign to make the United States “the crypto capital of the world.”
On Thursday evening, Trump signed an executive order to establish a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve for the United States.
White House artificial intelligence and crypto czar David Sacks is calling the planned Strategic Bitcoin Reserve a “Fort Knox for the cryptocurrency often called ‘digital gold.’”
The Trump administration hopes to use cryptocurrency to reduce the national debt of $36 trillion.
Some investment analysts warn the crypto market is too volatile as a safe haven for government investment. Unlike other investments, it has no equity or hard assets to back up its value.
Other industry leaders, such as Nathan McCauley, the chief executive of the crypto firm Anchorage Digital, praised Trump’s executive order as a bold investment venture.
“By holding bitcoin and other digital assets for the long term, the White House is taking a future-forward approach,” McCauley said in a statement. “Expect this move to catalyze crypto adoption among more governments and institutions.”
In the first few weeks of Trump’s second presidency, the Securities and Exchange Commission has halted litigation against seven cryptocurrency exchanges. The litigation was started during the Biden administration.
An unusual feature of the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve is how it would be funded, namely through law enforcement.
Cryptocurrency seized by the U.S. government through civil forfeitures and criminal prosecutions would be transferred to the reserve, thereby eliminating the burden on taxpayers to pay for it.
“The government will not acquire additional assets for the stockpile beyond those obtained through forfeiture proceedings,” Sacks wrote in a post on social media site X.
Any additional cryptocurrency seized under the order would add to a government stockpile of about $17 billion that already has been amassed.
The most recent large-scale takedown of crypto fraudsters was announced by the Justice Department on Friday.
The Justice Department unsealed an indictment against Aleksej Besciokov, 46, a Lithuanian national and Russian resident, and Aleksandr Mira Serda, 40, a Russian citizen. They are charged with operating a multibillion-dollar cryptocurrency money laundering service through the digital asset exchange Garantex.
It remains uncertain whether the U.S. government will be able to seize their assets.
Cryptocurrency prices dropped slightly Friday as investors said they were hoping for a more forceful commitment from Trump for government investment.
Instead, the order said federal agencies should seek ways to buy bitcoin in a “budget neutral” way.
In addition to bitcoin, the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve would acquire cryptocurrencies such as Ether, Solana’s SOL and Cardano’s ADA.
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